A Wizard Gone Rogue
by RandoMaia
Summary: Nita and Kit are on the trail of a wizard gone rogue, but something else is interfering... PLEASE R&R. PG for mild language.
1. A Wizard Leaving

A/N: Hi guys! This is my first fanfic, and I'm kind of hyper (but then, I'm always hyper, so...). Please R&R. I do not own the Young Wizards series, they are the property of the brilliant Diane Duane, so please don't sue. *Dials lawyers just in case*  
  


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Nita Callahan appeared suddenly in her back yard. Just appeared out of thin air. Of course, nobody saw. Nita's dad had let the trees grow tall and wild so none of the neighbors would see her popping in and out. If nosey-Mrs.-next-door saw her emerge from her barrier of trees, she would just assume that the silly girl had been hiding here all the time.

But Nita hadn't been there the whole time. She had just gotten back from school, and was going to see Kit in a few minutes.

Kit. Her best friend. Her partner. Her fellow wizard. She had done everything with him. Their relation was seamless. Well, more or less. The _had_ gotten into a fight yesterday when Kit had accused her of robbing a store with a wizardry. _Powers That Be, did he actually think I did it?_ wondered Nita.

The fact was, this rouge wizard was actually causing quite a problem. He had been looting stored and killing cops, but there was no way to stop a wizard with guns and alarms. Nita expected that someone would be put on assignment to stop him, but when she consulted her Wizards Manual, it said that the information about the job was confidential.

_Oh well_, thought Nita. _I better go meet Kit and get started on that Martian Project. _"Dad," she called, entering the house and swinging down her bag, "I'm home!" No reply. _That's funny. I expect I'll see him later though,_ mused Nita, walking over to the fruit bowl and grabbing herself an orange. She dug her fingernail into it, but it had no effect against the stubborn peel. 

"_Um, would you mind giving me a hand with the peel?" _she said in Speech to the orange. 

"_Certainly," _it responded, and moments later the peel shimmered, then disappeared to reappear in Nita's hand. 

"_Thanks," _she said before putting the orange on a plate and walking out to the table with it. 

There she munched absentmindedly, looking at her Manual and trying to come up with an actual spell to remove orange peels instead of asking the orange itself. After several minutes, however, she had no ideas and no orange, so she got up and walked out the door, thinking the six words of a spell she knew be heart to send her Manual into her hand, where it appeared with a small 'pop.' She strode out into the back yard, savoring the crisp air and the pure pale-blue sky.

She put her hand on a twisted rowan tree and closed her eyes, letting herself slide into the tree's time-sense. 

"_Hello," _said the tree in Speech, the language of all living things.

_"Hi Liused," _responded Nita. 

"_Do you need anything from me today?"_

_"Well…" _Nita felt a bit awkward asking this,_ "I was wondering if I could have a branch."_

_"Of course," _said the rowan, dropping a branch to the ground_._

_"Thanks very much_," said Nita, then pulled away, entering the normal time-flow_._ She stooped and picked up the branch, then felt around in the air. Her hand found a hard bit in the air, the zipper of her air pocket, in which she stored her materials. She tugged to the right and dropped the branch into the pocket. With a sigh, she continued to rummage inside, thinking _Man,__ I've got to clean this thing out sometime. There's stuff in here from last decade! _Finally, she found what she was looking for; a tangible circle of Speech. She dropped it to the ground, stepped inside it, and began to read. 

This was what Nita loved about wizardry. The silence, the expectation in the air when you were reading a spell, that feeling of nature leaning in to listen. The thrill and excitement that came from curing a wounded animal or straightening a crooked tree. It was wonderful. Now, as the scilence pressed in around her and nature listened closely to her words, Nita felt again the wonders of working a wizardry, but still, she missed the voice that should have been speaking along with hers. 

Then, she completed the spell, and vanished.


	2. A Wizard Interrupted

A/N: Hello peeps. Sorry, I know it's been a long time. If anyone wants to look at my megar homepage so far, please do so (www.essenceofoddness.com). Okay, so this is the second chap, please R&R.

Disclaimer: I don't own it. If you don't sure, I'll be your friend. Wink wink I'll give you a dollar. Wink wink. I won't infringe anymore copyright laws. Wink wi—well, maybe not, but…

"Kit, give me a hand with –"

"Yeah, the grill. I know."

Kit Rodriguez traipsed down the stairs, but at the bottom, he was tackled by something large and furry. "_Hi, Ponch_," he said, scratching the big dog behind the ears.

_Can I have a hamburger?_

Kit laughed. "_Popi is having trouble with the grill again. When I get it lit, ask him if you can have __a__ burger. Until then…" _

He let the sentence hang and walked out into the garden. Spring was in the air, in the vibrant green

of the trees, the incessant chatter of the sun-warmed rocks (which he could hear with his wizard's ear), and the swearing of his father as he struggled to light the grill, using some words that not even a wizard could understand.

"Damn thing," said Kit's father, backing away from the grill, moping his sweaty face. "Have a go at it."

Kit probed his memory for the spell that he had used the last spring when his dad was having

trouble with the grill, and began to recite, describing in Speech exactly what he wanted done. Sure enough, as soon as he finished, the grill lighted, and he slumped against a tree, temporarily drained from the wizardry, which had used up some of his personal energy. His father, meanwhile, rushed enthusiastically to the grill and began to cook the hamburgers.

When he had gotten his strength back, Kit walked back into the house to find his sister, Carmela, having a fight with the television. Carmela wasn't a wizard, but she had picked up on the Speech from Kit. Lately, there had been a wizardry leakage in the house; Ponch was discovering new universes,

Carmela was using Speech, and the TV showed alien cable channels from time to time if it got angry at anyone.

At this moment, 'Mela was sitting on a lumpy couch, yelling at the remote, "Go the right effing channel or else, you stupid hunk on silicon!"

Kit rolled his eyes, and was about to point out that the remote wasn't going to do anything until its batteries got replaced, when the phone rang.

Kit's mama picked it up in the kitchen, listened for a moment, and called to Kit, "It's Tom."

Tom Swale and Carl Romeo were the Advisories in Kit's area, the ones who had to help wizards whenever they had a problem. "Kit?" said Tom's voice through the phone.

"Yeah," said Kit, leaning against the back of the couch.

"Listen, I know you and Nita wanted to get started on the Martian project, but could you come over here first? I think I have an assignment for you two. Give her a ring for me, okay?"

"Sure," said Kit, and hung up. _I wonder what assignment is so important that we have to get it __directly__ from the Advisories_, mused Kit, as he reached out with his mind, trying to connect with Nita.

The bond of a wizardly partnership can be a very strong thing. Kit and Nita had been able to contact each other telepathically, using _mindtouch_, as wizards called it, ever since they started their Ordeal. Now, they were both a bit out of practice, but, Kit reasoned, still searching for her mind, it was quicker than teleporting to Mars for her. _Aha_,he thought triumphantly, finally touching Nita's mind.

_Nita?_

Silence. Kit tried again.

_Nita?_

This time there was an answer: _Mmmh!_

_That's the greeting I get?_

_Sorry Kit. You surprised me, that's all. We haven't done this for a while. So, what's up?_

_Tom and Carl called. They want to talk to us. Pop back and meet me at their place in ten minutes, __kay__?_

_Make it five,_ responded Nita enthusiastically. _This atmosphere is giving me a rash. I think I __screwed up on the protection spell. _

She severed the connection, and Kit, after calling good-bye to his parents, bounded out of his rickety screen door and started on the jog to Tom and Carl's.


	3. A Wizard's Task

A/N: Yes, I'm back. Don't think I would abandon you guys. I'm hard at work on this fanfic, and I plan to do a one-shot soon that is either another Young Wizards musical or a "Harry Potter Meets the Pillsbury Doughboy" story, basicly where Harry squishes him and pokes him in the stomach a lot. Anyway, I DO NOT own any part of the YW series, they are all DD's, please don't sue. Thanks. Enjoy.  
  
Tom Swale greeted Nita at the door. He was a tall, good looking man in his late forties and, Nita noticed, a disturbing amount of gray sprinkled among his otherwise jet black hair. "Come in," said Tom warmly, ushering her inside. "Something to drink? Coke, maybe?"  
  
"Yes please," replied Nita, shrugging off her parka, which was useless in this heat but very comfortably on Mars, and slinging it over the back of a chair.  
  
A very muffled, "Hi, Nita," came from what appeared to be a solitary pair of legs because the torso of the man was hidden underneath the kitchen sink. There was a clunk, a garbled swear, a clatter as a wire clipper slid to the floor, and the tap on the sink exploded, spraying water everywhere.  
  
Carl Romeo hurriedly extricated himself from the piping, and muttered to the sink in Speech, "If you don't cut this out I'm going to unscrew you and use you as a crowbar, got it?"  
  
Immediately, the spraying stopped. Nita raised her eyebrow and chuckled. "A bit harsh, don't you think?"  
  
"Nah," said Carl, pulling a bottle of Coke out of the fridge and tossing it to Nita, who caught it deftly. "I've been wrestling with that damn sink for about a week.  
  
Tom pulled up a chair beside Nita. "Yeah, seems that everything about this house is trying to kill him now."  
  
Nita laughed. "Wasn't that happening a month ago too? Hey, Kit."  
  
Kit had just jogged up the path and through the still open door, his forehead beading sweat.  
  
"Why'd you run, idiot?" asked Nita, punching him jokingly on the arm. "Why not just pop in?"  
  
"Okay. Let's get this over with so I can finish wrestling with the sink," interrupted Carl, sitting down across from Nita and rubbing his hands together in a businesslike way. "We want you two to tackle an assignment for us." He paused, as though waiting for someone else to speak, than continued, "Have you heard about those robberies that some of the advisories think were done by a wizard?"  
  
Kit and Nita nodded mutely. Are they really going to ask us to find the thief? thought Nita. That's absurd. There's no way they would do that.  
  
Tom's voice broke into her thoughts. "You job," he said, "is to bring down the person behind the robberies, the wizard gone rogue, I guess you'd call him.  
  
She stared. Just sat and stared at Tom as what he was saying began to sink in. "We have to catch...?" She trailed away into nothingness and glanced at Kit, who looked just as shocked by their assignment as she did.  
  
Carl consulted his manual, which was lying on the table and was the size of a phonebook today, and then looked up. "I think it's best if you try to figure out where the rogue is hiding by spooking a gang he's rumored to be working with."  
  
He turned to Tom, who took the hint and continued the conversation. "There are about six or seven of them," he said, drumming his fingers on the tabletop. "They wear red and black motorcycle jackets and hang around Central Park when they're not doing a job. So, what you have to do it –"  
  
He was cut off as a buzzer rang somewhere in the house. "Oh crud, we've gotta run," he said, shutting his manual with a snap. "Look, I'll put something in the book, but you'll figure it out, I'm sure. Good luck, you two." He hurried off into the back of the house with Carl.  
  
There was a long and uncomfortable silence. "Um..." Kit said eventually, but seemed unable to finish.  
  
There was another pause then: "Do you think they meant it?" asked Nita, gripping her empty Coke bottle hard.  
  
"Yeah. They can't lie, they're wizards."  
  
"Well... can you come over to my house? We've gotta talk this over."  
  
"Sure thing," said Kit, pushing himself up from his chair. "I just have to pop home and ask my parents. On second thought, though... I'll just call them from your place."  
  
Nita stood and tossed her bottle in the trash, then continued out the door. The fresh air was reassuring, but it did nothing to shut out her growing apprehension about her assignment. If this rogue was powerful enough to cast a spell that would throw the Powers That Be off their trail so that they had to send a wizard after him... well, she didn't want to think about what he might do to her and Kit if he got the chance.  
  
She began to open her claudation, her head still buzzing, but before she had fully opened the zipper of wizardry, Kit laid his hand on her wrist, stopping her.  
  
"Can we walk?" he asked. "I'm a bit shaky, and I'm not really up to a transit right now.  
  
Nita considered for a moment. "Yeah, you're right," she said, shaking her head. "I don't really feel that great either."  
  
And they walked off into the sunset, both with their own thoughts, but one prominent among them in both their minds: how the heck are we going to get this job done?! 


	4. A Wizard's Offer

A/N: Yet another chap set up. Please review. I know this looks a lot like a plotless piece of crap, but it isn't (not really, anyway). Oh, yeah: I DO NOT own any part of the Young Wizards series, DD owns it all, please don't sue, thanks.  
  
Kit and Nita, breathing slightly faster than they would have usually, opened Nita's door and entered, glad of the comfort of a familiar place. "Hi Daddy," Nita called to her father, who was in the kitchen busily making coffee.  
  
"Hi Neets," he replied. "Hey Kit."  
  
"'Lo, Mr. Callahan," said Kit respectfully. "We wanted to talk over an assignment we just got. That okay?"  
  
"Sure, sure. Go ahead."  
  
Halfway to Nita's room, they were impeded by a small, hyper figure. "So?" asked Dairine Callahan. "What's the assignment?"  
  
Nita groaned. Little sisters could be such a pain sometimes. "Go jump off a cliff, runt," she said, starting again up the stairs. On the fifth step she paused and turned, intending to ask why Dairine hadn't been home after school let out, but took a closer look at her sister's face and gasped a little.  
  
"Dari..."  
  
"What did you do, set the house on fire?" asked Kit bemusedly.  
  
Sure enough, Dairine's face was sooty and one of her eyebrows had been singed off. "Well," she said, shifting her weight from foot to foot, "it's a long story..." Kit grinned, hit eyes flashing. "You don't have to tell us if you don't interrupt us."  
  
"Deal," said Dairine quickly, hurrying past where they stood on the stairs and into her room, slamming the door.  
  
"Well, that takes care of her. Let's go." And Kit walked up the stairs into Nita's room, Nita herself close behind him.  
  
"Well?" she said, closing the door behind them. "What're we going to do?"  
  
"Take the assignment, of course," said Kit, although he looked pale and shaky.  
  
"I know that, smart guy." Nita sat down on the bed, feeling a bit shaky herself. "I mean, how?"  
  
"Well, it's like Tom said, isn't it? We have to hunt down the gang he's been working with and spook them into telling us. I figure maybe some cloaking spells and a transit circle... maybe we can rig up some flashing lights or something; the Manual probably has a section on party tricks. And once we get the information from them..." His sentence trailed into nothingness, and, looking slightly helpless, sat down next to Nita.  
  
Nita stared at him thoughtfully. "Y'know," she said softly, "that just might work. Listen, we have to get them away from other people, so that means we have to do it at night, right?" Kit nodded, and began rummaging in his claudation for his Manual. "Do you think," Nita continued, "that we should do it tomorrow night? Just to get it over with, I mean.  
  
Kit grunted in agreement, and began tugging at his Manual, which was still in the claudation. "It's... stuck!" he said through gritted teeth.  
  
"Never mind," said Nita sympathetically. "I'll do it." She reached down her hand in the same position as Kit, closed her fingers over the Manual, and gave a huge heave, which send her sprawling backwards into Kit. "I don't know what happened," she admitted sheepishly. "I expected some resistance because you couldn't get it, but then it came out so easily... the only thing could have been that you didn't have to power to take it out.  
  
Her face suddenly grew thoughtful. "Now that I think of it, I haven't seen you do a spell all day. Something's up."  
  
Kit looked at her and sighed. "Check this." He sat down on the bed again where Nita joined him, and flicked through his Manual to his listing. It read:  
  
RODRIGUEZ, Christopher  
(RL 1.2 /- 0.5)  
CRITICAL POWER  
  
"Powers That Be, Kit, do you have any idea what this means?" Nita was flabbergasted. There was almost no way Kit could have a power level that low. That meant to do any spells might drain him for a day or so. And that kind of risk was disastrous on assignment. "So?" she asked quietly. "What are we going to do?"  
  
"You're going to have to feed me power. I'm sorry Neets, I really am, but it's either that or you have to do it alone, and I won't let you do that. Apart from that, there's just no other way."  
  
Nita glanced at the door and saw Dairine's eager mug peering around it. She muttered something in Speech and made a rapid arm movement, a spell that caused the door to swing shut in Dairine's face. "Okay," she said firmly. "Let's do it tomorrow night. I'll have a power feed spell ready. Meet me here at ten, okay? So we'll have the day to play this. I don't know what we'd do it if wasn't a weekend..."  
  
Kit broke the uneasy silence. "Well, I thing I should be heading home. My parents will be wondering where I am. Bye."  
  
As Kit left the room, Dairine entered it. "Spill," she ordered, sitting down on Nita's bed. Nita chewed indecisively on her fingernail for a moment, and then told her.  
  
"... and now Kit's at a critical power level, and we have this huge assignment. What should we do?"  
  
Dairine raised her one remaining eyebrow. "Do you need me to help you? I could do the power feed, so you can just do the work."  
  
Nita breathed a sigh of relief. "Oh, thank you Dari!" she said, hugging her sister.  
  
"Enough," Dairine grunted from inside Nita's back-breaking embrace. "If you squish me, I won't be able to help at all."  
  
A/N: extremely crappy wasn't it? I am leading up to something, so you know, but this is my first fanfic so I don't really know what pace to write at and I'll probably end up going too fast or too slow so I apologize in advance for that. Also, I'm working on a big school project so there may not be any updates for a while, sorry. 


	5. A Wizard In Action

A/N: Me is back! YAY! huggles readers I'm soooooooooo sorry, I had this major school project (it proves that my L. A. teacher is a bi-atch). Anyway, nice juicy chap w/ lots of plot development. Enjoy, and please review.  
  
"Well, this is the easiest part," Nita said, pacing the gravel walkway of Central Park. "It'll be pretty fun, actually, but I can't stop thinking what will happen after this."  
  
Kit nodded sympathetically. "Yeah," he murmured, flicking through his manual to the pages he had bookmarked.  
  
Nita toyed with a charm on the silvery charm bracelet she wore and gave Kit an exasperated sigh. "I would have made you a matrix so you'd have all your spells right there, but you were convinced that a boy couldn't be seen in a bracelet, and now you've spend half an hour cramming." Her expression softened in a moment however, and she asked, "Did Dairine set up the power feed?"  
  
"She did," said Kit. "About thirty spells' worth of power in it if it holds." He snapped his manual shut. "I see them. Let's do it."  
  
Sure enough, peering around a thick tree trunk, through the descending evening gloom and the last of the blood-red sunset glow, Nita saw a group of about five or six tall, muscular men in flashy black leather motorcycle jackets striped with a blood red setting up a card table for Three-Card Monty.  
  
"You remember the plan?" Kit nodded, and Nita stepped out from behind the trees and hedges that had separated them from the gang. She walked purposefully out to the table, where no one stood but the gang members, because she and Kit had placed a binding spell around the edges of the area to stop people witnessing their wizardry.  
  
"Hello," said Nita, acting as naively cheerful as she could. "Can I have a game?"  
  
The hoods sniggered behind their hands. "Sure kid," said a thickset one with a shiny bald head and a hoop earring. "Whatcha betting?"  
  
Nita shrugged he shoulders. "As much as you want me to."  
  
The men could hardly hide their glee. "All right," said a tall, scraggly one with unruly dark hair. "Let's make it seventy-five bucks, then." He stepped up to the table and produced two black aces and one red one from a deck of cards on the table. "Pick the red card after I shuffle them," he said, setting the cards down and mixing them face-down on the table at lightening speed.  
  
Nita knew that crooks that played Three-Card Monty slipped the red card off the table and replaced it with a hidden black card, but she had suspected something like this would happen, and had a spell ready. She fingered a charm on her charm bracelet of two arrows pointing to each other so that they formed a circle. "My good luck charm," she said to the curious hoods to add to her image of the trusting, idiotic country girl. The charm sent a spell into her head, one that was almost completed, and needed nothing but the right words...  
  
"The middle card."  
  
The man who had shuffled the cards laughed. "Sorry, kiddy, but you're wrong. Gimme the money."  
  
Nita raised her eyebrows. "Are you sure about that? Flip the card."  
  
The man gave another snort of laughter and shook his head, but flipped the card. The group gasped. Thanks to Nita's switching spell, they were all staring down at the ace of diamonds. Nita grinned. "You don't have to pay me," she said, "if you answer some questions." The bald man nodded dumbly, and Nita continued, "Who have you been working with? I know you were involved in a big bunch of thefts recently; who was leading you?"  
  
A short man with bulging biceps and a chin covered in stubble flexed his muscles threateningly. "We don't tell no one nothing 'bout how we operate."  
  
_Now_, Nita thought to Kit.  
  
He received the thought, and sent back, _On my way_. A mysterious voice spoke from the shadows behind the trees that Nita recognized as Kit's; "Not even me?"  
  
A man from the back of the group shoved to the front and leered, saying, "No, not even you, smart guy. Who are you and where are you so I can beat the crap outta you?"  
  
"Right here." Kit's voice spoke from a foot away from the man, but he still wasn't visible. "Oh, I suppose you want to see me then." Kit pulled off the cloaking spell and appeared next to Nita, dressed in a billowing blue robe that he had said before made him feel like a monk. Nita again gripped the switch-spell charm on her bracelet, mentally replaced the coordinates, and let it loose. With a small 'pop,' her casual jeans and T-shirt were replaced by a robe of the same sort as Kit's, only of a vivid purple.  
  
"What's the matter?" Nita asked. "You've never seen a wizard before?"  
  
Some of the gang members gasped, but the bald man stood confidently at the front of the group. "Wizard, hah!" he said with a derisive snort. "Prove it!"  
  
"Okay," said Kit coolly. He began to mutter under his breath, beginning the spell that Nita recognized at the one used to levitate objects. One of the park benches was trembling and about to lift off the ground, when Kit suddenly stopped the spell and slumped to the floor. Nita rushed to him and felt his wrist. There was a pulse.  
  
"The feed stopped," he said weakly. "Just zap me home and finish the job."  
  
Nita teleported Kit home with the help of the charm on her bracelet of a car, but she was hidden from the gang's view by a cluster of bushes.  
  
"What are you doing back there?" called the tall, messy-haired man, smirking at them. "Setting up your next special effect?" Several people laughed, and the speaker looked heartened. Nita thought fast. "I had to get rid of my partner. He only slows me down, you know. Now, did you say you wanted to see my – what did you call it – special effects?" There were jeers from the gang, and one stepped forward. He was quite good- looking, his bleached-blonde surfer dude style hair falling casually over one eye. "Okay," he said with a derisive laugh. "Show me, girlie!" "Very well. You look like the kind of person who could beat up a little girl like me. Try to attack me." As she said this, Nita held a charm that looked like an old-fashioned battle shield and recited the nine syllables of the shield spell. The man turned to his comrades, shrugged, and sneered. "You're gonna get pounded to a pulp, you know," he said, advancing and beginning to pummel Nita. He kept this up for about a minute, and satisfied, backed up to his gang, but his laughter died in his throat as he saw Nita standing perfectly normally as if nothing had happened. "Do you want another demonstration?" asked Nita. "Hah!" called the bald man, his earring dancing. "Yeah, I do!" Nita raised her eyebrows, but her hand went again to her bracelet, clutching two charms next to each other; the feather charm and one that looked like a strobe light. In her mind, she recited them, filling in the data required by such spells. The wizardry completed, she began to rise into the air, slowly, majestically, until she hovered two yards off the ground (she didn't dare go higher unless she wanted to risk being spotted by someone). She seemed surrounded by an aura of light, because of her other spell, which also caused little sparks to shoot off her. "Spill," she demanded. "Tell me who you're working for, or I could turn ugly." Finally, the hoods were being intimidated; some even backed up all the way to the edge of the path. "Okay," said the bald man, looking frightened at last. "We've been getting orders from this guy... he's pretty short, always wears this cloak-thing so I've never seen his face. He offered to pay us well. He has this thing of... well, keeping the cops away somehow, and diffusing alarms and stuff. He says he lives on Fire Island or something, but we've never seen his place. That's all I can tell you." "Okay," Nita said slowly. "So, I can't really have you remembering this, can I?" The gripped the eraser charm on her bracelet and completed the spell that came almost fully-formed into her mind; the next minute, the entire gang had their eyes closed and were standing dreamily. Nita gripped her car charm again and teleported home, vanishing with a 'pop.' 


	6. A Wizard Indeterminate

A/N Sry peeps, I know it's been a while, but my parents have been eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeevil! (I. E. forcing me into a camp that goes really late and making me wash dishes in every spare moment I have.) Anyway, here is the next chap, another Kit POV bevcause i notice that D. D. alternates POVs, and even though I like writing Nita better... Short I know, but I want at least one cliffhanger to piss you readers off Anyway, enjoy and revieew review review!!!!!!!!!!  
  
Kit rolled over sleepily, roused from a very deep slumber because of a loud buzzing issuing from somewhere in his room. Without bothering to investigate, he muttered six syllables, a simple spell to soundproof the area directly around his bed. When the buzzing slowly faded, leaving Kit free to fall back asleep, he suddenly became wide awake at the realization that he had done a spell.   
  
_This is great,_ thought Kit, scrambling out of bed to check his power levels in the manual. _I'll be able to help Nita with the assignment now._ He wasn't sure if this was a good thing or a bad thing, but before he could decide, he stepped outside the boundaries of the soundproof spell and was surprised to find the buzzing emanating from, not some stray alarm clock that hadn't been turned off, but from his wizards manual.  
  
His face fell, and he opened his book to a page flashing in red, prepared for the worst. It said:

CALLAHAN, Dairine E. Journeyman Rating  
243 E. Clinton Avenue ?? (RL 7.2 /- 1.4) ??   
Hempstead NY 11575 ?? STATUS: MISSING

Kit's jaw dropped, and he rushed down the stairs to the kitchen phone, his own power levels forgotten. He skirted the corner and ran smack into Carmela, wearing a ridiculously fuzzy bathrobe, a pink bathrobe, and a frown.   
  
Watch where you're going, Kit, his older sister admonished. What're you doing up?  
  
Right back atcha, Kit said, striding quickly past her. He picked up the phone and said to the receiver in Speech, _Dial Nita._  
  
The phone considered refusing and asking Kit to be moved to his bedroom, but noticed the young wizard's haste, and, deciding not to annoy him further, dialed Nita's house.  
  
said a sleepy voice on the other end.  
  
said Kit hurriedly, can I speak to -- Dairine?  
  
Kit heaved a sigh of relief; it was Dairine who had answered the phone, tired but very much there. Dairine, what happened last night? With the feed? Did you crash?  
  
Dairine made a noncommittal noise, somewhere between dunno' and murmf.' With a shuddering yawn, she said, Come over, I'll explain it, but for Powers' sake, _later_, you idiot!  
  
With a shrug, Kit wandered into the living room and glanced up at the clock: 7:39. _Crud,_ he thought. _Way too early for me on a Saturday._ All the same, Nita was an early riser. He reacher out with his mind...  
  
_Neets?  
  
That you, Kit? she answered.  
  
Who else talks to you with Mindtouch? Did I wake you up?_   
  
Kit felt Nita shake her head, realize that he couldn't see her, and say _No, I was reading. The phone woke me up about five minutes ago and couldn't get back to sleep. How about you; what's your excuse?  
  
I'll tell you in a bit. Put a shirt on, I'm popping over. This is urgent! _Kit let their connection dissolve and hurried back up to his room to get dressed.

At 7:41, Kit appeared in Nita's bedroom and said, to Nita, who was sitting on the foot of her bed.  
  
Hey yourself, she said grinning. What's up?  
  
As Nita listened in silence, Kit explained about the manual setting off its alarm, and about calling Nita, and about Dairine answering. He finished the explanation, and Nita looked at him curiously, her brow furrowed in confusion. Dairine's not here, she said.


	7. A Wizard Trapped

A/N: Hi all, I know it's been AGES since I updated, sorry. I was on vacation. Anyway, enjoy the chap. Please refrain from flogging me to death because of the long wait. 

The sky above her head was a deep velvety blue, so dark it was almost black. No stars shone through the crushing darkness and no sound disturbed the silence that hung heavy on the air. Dairine forged on, through the vast expanse of nothingness. She shivered; there was a lingering sent on the air, foreign but familiar, like a favorite movie in a different language. The sky was growing darker now, the blue changing, little by little, to black, and suddenly...  
  
It wasn't sky at all, but a ceiling. Dairine was in a dark room with the walls all painted black. It was so dark that she could barely see her hands held up right in front of her face. Quite suddenly, there was a human form in the room with her. The room grew almost imperceptibly lighter. In fact, the light seemed to be emanating from the person, who had raised both his arms into the air. The light grew and grew, until it was almost blinding in its brilliance, painful to look at, burning Dairine's eyes. She tried to turn away, to cover her eyes, but the light was filling every particle of her. She fell to the floor, writhing, and although it was too dark for anyone to see it, the figure smiled.

* * *

Nita looked oddly at Kit. Dairine's not here, she repeated. She's on a sleepover at a friends house.  
  
Kit furrowed his brow. Listen, Neets, the manual says she's missing. I don't know what that's supposed to mean, but we better see Tom and Carl about this.  
  
He started to stand but Nita rolled her eyes and pulled him back. Kit, do you have any idea what time it is? she said exasperatedly. Deep inside, Nita felt a pang. Dairine might be angsty and annoying as hell, but she was, after all, Nita's sister. With a small shake of her head, Nita pushed her feelings to the back of her mind; she would deal with those later. She had to concentrate now.  
  
Nita and Kit spent an hour or so talking over the various things that the manual could mean by Nita had written up a list of what they had agreed upon that they were both pouring over when the phone rang. Nita jumped up to get it before it could wake up her father, still asleep in his room. Nita, it's Carl, said the voice on the other line. Listen, in the manual... there's something you should know... Nita cut him off. Dairine's missing, Kit told me. said Carl, obviously uncomfortable, then you won't mind me asking where you saw her last.  
  
Nita's lips pursed for a moment, then she said, Last night she said she was going for a sleepover with a friend.  
  
Carl thought for a moment, and then said, Did she seem at all odd. Ticked off, maybe, or distant? Nita thought about this for a moment. A few days ago, she was ticked off at Kit because I told her he said I was the wizard robbing the stores. She said he was a jerk and went to cal him and yell at him, but I stopped her, and she got angry at me. Then, the next night, she was supposed to set up a power feed for Kit, but it failed, or something. I haven't heard from her since. I came home and my dad said she had gone for a sleepover.By the way, Neets, sorry about thinking you were the rogue. It was.... said Nita slowly, quite forgetting about Carl, who could be heard over the phone paging through one of the telephone book-sized volumes of his Senior's manual, why did you think it was me? Kit shifted uncomfortably. There was an article in the manual... a power signature... a Callahan... well, um, never mind. I guess the Area Seniors read the signature wrong.  
  
Nita raised her eyebrows. Er... I kinda' doubt that. But a Callahan signature... _Dairine!_  
  
Kit shook his head. I thought it was you, and not Dairine, he admitted, because the power levels were different. Dairine is still more powerful than you, and the levels were about yours.  
  
There was a crackle on the phone. Hello, hello? came Carl's voice.  
  
said Nita hurriedly, what can you tell us about the power signatures on those wizard robberies?  
  
Carl took a moment to answer. Well... actually a Callahan signature... five-ish power levels... and that's all I can say. Sorry.  
  
Nita's brain seemed to be on fire. More calmly than she felt, she said, Thanks Carl. I gotta run. Bye. She slammed down the phone and turned to Kit. she said slowly, you were losing your power a little while ago... what if it was contagious, some virus or something?  
  
Kit thought hard. His power had been leaving him slowly, as if being leached by some mysterious power, and had returned as soon as Dairine had disappeared. So maybe... nah.  
  
he said with a groan, I think we have to get to work on a tracer spell for her.  
  
Nita groaned as well and pulled a pad of paper toward her.A/N: I have no idea where I got the power signature idea from, but it seemed to fit with the plot. It probably doesn't make sense to you people (it doesn't make perfect sense to me), so please bear with me. Again, please please please don't flog me. 


	8. The Wizard that Never Was

Disclaimer: Um…not mine… all hers… don't sue…

A/N: W'sup? It's alive… mwahahaha… I know I've been _ages_ but… well, I don't really have an excuse. Oh, and this isn't really supposed to be NK fluff, I know it looks that way, but I'm not that crazy. I know I take eons to update, but unless I post a little note on my stories saying that they're dead, I will still update at some time. Don't go calling the morgue on this one, it's very much alive. But, now to respond to a few reviews that I think need addressing…

VampireNextDoor: Rrrrr! Don't go screwing up my excuses!!!! Lucy Moses' fault, all their fault… arg, now I'm just desperate.

Venus Goddess Sailor Manga U: Wow, I spelled your pen name right on the first try! A miracle… ulp! Flogging! (Hides behind a tree)

The clock on Nita's bedside table read 7:50. The alarm began to buzz. Kit snapped his fingers at it, and said sharply in Speech, the equivalent of _Shaddup!_ The alarm obeyed meekly.

Nita put her head in her hands. _What's gonna happen?_ she thought desperately. _I'm scared_… She shook her head violently as if trying to send these worries flying out her ears, and turned back to her desk. A notebook sat open on it, a pencil lying across it. The page was filled with squiggles, boxes, and almost illegible written Speech. Nita picked up the book and read what she had so far. "Kit," she called.

"Eh?" was Kit's brilliant response. He had been dictating a spell to his manual in a soft voice, and his head snapped around at the sound of his name.

"This might work. Here, look it over." Nita tossed the notebook to Kit, who almost caught it, but dropped it and had to stop it in midair with a word of Speech and bring it back up to where he sat cross-legged on Nita's bed. He picked the pad out of the air and began to read what Nita had written.

Kit rubbed his neck and hopped off the bed. "Well, it's a little crude. The place where you plug in her data should have some kind of containment, and… You look terrible. You should get some coffee or something, or at least a chocolate milk. And… you know… tell your dad.

Nita nodded mutely. She had been dreading this, but knew it had to be done. "Keep working while I'm downstairs," she told Kit as she left the room. "We can't afford to waste time on this."

Nita went down the stairs slowly, not wanting to see the person who would be at the bottom. When she finally reached the dining room, she found her father sitting at the table with a newspaper and a cup of coffee. "Well, you're up early," said Nita, her voice as falsely bright as she could make it.

"Not my fault," he grunted. "I had a hard time getting to sleep, and then that darn phone call at 7:30. Who calls at _7:30?!_

"Um, Dad… Daddy…" Nita stopped, swallowed, and started again. "Daddy… Something happened to Dairine."

Her father looked at her questioningly. "Who's Dairine?" he asked finally.

After Mr. Callahan assured his daughter that no, he was not joking, and that he had no idea who 'Dairine' was, Nita, barely containing panic, dismissed it by saying Dairine was a friend from school who she suspected had caught a cold, and dashed back upstairs for Kit.

"He doesn't know!" she said breathlessly to Kit as she slammed her door. "He doesn't even remember who she is! This is horrible, I think it was a memory blocker, oh, Kit…" she trailed off and slumped against a shocked Kit, who caught her and held her awkwardly.

Nita began to sob slightly into Kit's shoulder. Kit contemplated patting Nita on the back, but decided it wouldn't do any good, so instead, he gave her a brief hug, then stepped back from her and shook her by the shoulders. "Neets, snap out of it! I'm scared for Dairine too, I'm confused, I have no idea what's going on, but nothing's gonna get done about it if we stand here! Here, look at this spell."

Nita weakly took the manual from Kit, wiped her eyes on her sleeve, and flipped to the page where Kit had recorded his spell. Her eyes grew wider as they scanned the sheet of the manual's neat Speech recording. Her jaw dropped at the end of the page, her grip on the small red book slackened from shock. "Kit…" she said hesitantly. "Kit… Powers, Kit, this is amazing! Do you know what kind of spell writing this is? It's an advisory-quality at least!"

Kit shrugged as modestly as he could, and his face reddened slightly. "It just sorta… came to me."

"Oh, Kit, this is brilliant! Thank you, thank you!" For the second time in mere minutes, Nita flung her arms around Kit's neck. Kit pried her off as gently as he could.

"Relax, Neets, we still have to work the spell," he reminded her.

"Well, come on, we can't waste any time, but with a spell like this…"

"Where are we going to do it?" asked Kit, starting to pull out his "canned" Speech name from his claudation.

"Uh… Dairine's room, I guess." Nita frowned in concentration. "Yeah, Dairine's room. It might be easier to work the spell from there. C'mon."

Kit stuffed his name back into the pocket, zipped it, and followed Nita from the room, carrying the pad with the spell written upon it.

At the door of Dairine's room, Nita stopped abruptly, and Kit walked right into her. She pushed him back forcefully. "Geez, Neets," grumbled Kit as he leaned against the opposite wall. "I just walked into you. Why are you being so… weird?" Nita had moved aside and was investigating the doorframe; she ignored Kit. He shrugged and walked towards the open door again, but was stopped by Nita, who stepped in front of him.

Angry now, Kit shoved his partner out of the way and made for the door once again. Nita said several fluid syllables in Speech, and Kit froze in his tracks, unable to move.

Nita moaned. "Kit, sorry, I had to. Didn't you see it?"

_What the Heck?!?_ asked a furious Kit inside Nita's mind. _You shove me around, no explanation, and then you freeze me! What's going on?_

Nita slapped her forehead with her hand in exasperation. "I can't believe you didn't notice it." She muttered something, and she immobilization spell was lifted, but she still kept a hand on Kit's shoulder to prevent him walking forward. Nita said, softly, "Look at the doorframe. Don't touch it, but look closely."

Kit, now thoroughly confused, narrowed his eyes, staring at the entrance to Dairine's room. "Nita, what…?" he began, but stopped abruptly. He had just registered a faint ripple in the air, like a barely-detectable heat mist.

Nita fished a marble out of her pocket and flicked it at the shimmer. It vanished when it hit the area. "Okay," said Nita decisively. "Let's just do it in my room. We can use a crayola or something to draw the spell circles on the rug, and magic-laundry it later."

Kit groaned. "Laundry…"

Nita gave him a pained look. He sighed, and walked into Nita's room. At a nod from Nita, who had her manual open in one hand and was looking at the spell that Kit had written and 'm-mailed' to it, he produced a string of Speech characters from his claudation, an "airbrush" that Dairine had designed earlier that year. With a flick of his wrist, the shimmering characters flew together into a slim rod of an unrecognizable substance. Muttering directions to the wizardry, Kit drew the diagram from the notepad onto the rug, referring back to his original frequently to check his work.

Nita watched him in fascination. He knew her better than anyone else, and she him, but he was still a mystery to her. His dark hair was neatly clipped and he was wearing jeans and the navy windbreaker he had bought to replace the lime green one that he had outgrown, but somehow, as he bent over his complex, incredible spell with overwhelming concentration, care, and talent, he seemed different. There was an elegance in the way he drew the circles, and a sureness in the way he drew his name in Speech. "Are you sure that's right," she asked, looking at Kit's name, which seemed oddly long, and at the part of the spell that indicated duration, which also looked too complex to be right.

"Don't sweat it, Neets," he said casually. "Put your name in." Nita took the airbrush from him and wrote her shorthand name into the spell, several curly streaks of Speech and a lesser "knot" to finish it.

Now came the spelling. Nita, as an experienced wizard, knew the effects of casting a spell, but still couldn't get enough of it; as she and Kit read the spell together, the world leaned in to listen. The sounds of the day seemed to grind to a halt as nature looked on in wonderment at the two wizards. The silence grew to be like a noise, so unbearably _silent_ that it was almost pain to listen to. But it wasn't painful at all; it was sheer joy, the delight of working a wizardry. She could hear the ever-familiar sound of Kit's voice, with that slight Hispanic accent, reading alongside her and playing their favorite game of trying to out-read the other partner, but it was impossible because the spell had caught them up, and was now reading them more than they were reading it. The silence built and built, and then… it popped so suddenly that the return of noise set their ears ringing. Nita staggered, weak from the loss of the energy she had put into the spell, and fell onto her bed, breathing hard. Kit followed suit.

"Nita?" A head poked around the door. Nita's father entered, a slightly puzzled look on his face. "What have you been… Nita!" For he had taken in the scene that Nita had just perceived herself; her and Kit panting on the bed. "And…" her dad continued helplessly, looking at the red marks on the carpet.

"Sorry, Mr. Callahan," cut in Kit swiftly, standing but still wobbly. "We were doing a big wizardry, and we just finished, so we haven't had time to clean it up. We'll get right on it. But it took a lot of energy out of us, so we were resting."

"What are you doing with my daughter, hooligan?"

"I told you, we were doing a wizardry –"

"What's all this garbage about wizardry? I don't want to hear another word from you, you… you… sex criminal!

Nita nearly jumped, but she couldn't spare the energy; her father had always rather liked Kit, but now he was acting as if he didn't know him… Ah! He _didn't_ know him. If he could be spelled to forget his own daughter, he surely could be made to forget about his other daughter's best friend and wizardry. "Daddy," she said softly, "I'm really sorry. I have to do this. You'll understand later. We'll figure out how to lift that spell soon, I promise."

Her father spluttered, "What…?" but stopped mid-sentence as the only daughter he could remember, always a nice and normal girl, began to chant nonsense words. Kit looked questioningly as well, but took the hint and stayed silent.

Nita barely had the energy for the spell. Even as she spoke the words from memory she realized that the world was not going quiet to watch as it usually did, but the spell seemed to be working well enough. She came to the final phrase, and held the last word into a kind of song for one moment. Then her father crumpled.

Kit turned and made some attempt to steady him, but succeeded only in breaking his fall. "What did you do?" he asked wonderingly.

"Sleeper spell, nothing major," said Nita, although her heart wrenched at the thought that she had just cursed her own father. "But does this mean that our spell didn't work?" And then things began to fade out. _Speak of the Lone One_, she thought to herself as she tumbled forward into blackness, but then decided not to. _Something tells me we won't have to get its attention; we should be seeing it soon enough…  
_  
A/N Again: Cliffhanger… ish, anyway. I'm so cruel… Was the viewpoint-switching confusing enough for you? Oh, it anyone thinks they know where this plot is going, say it in your review or e-mail it to me, because I'd love to hear them. I wanna see just how hard-to-follow this story is. Happy Thanksgiving!!!! (ness)


	9. A Wizard Wandering

Disclaimer: I don't own anything! You hear me, you lawyer vultures! NOTHING!

* * *

Nita began to fall forward, and Kit, bewildered, caught her by the shoulders to try to steady her. But then he himself began to fall onto the bed, and watched the world dissolving into black…

* * *

Kit's eyes were open, but he saw nothing except the deepest darkness he had ever seen. It had mass, it was pressing against his eyes and even his nose and mouth, suffocating him. He tried to twist away, but his body was stuck in the darkness, unable to move. _Help!_ he thought desperately. _Nita!_

_I'm here,_ came Nita's reply, so distant that it was barely audible. _It's this darkness that's muffling her thoughts,_ Kit realized, shocked, as he tried to force his lungs to draw breath. _Nita,_ he screamed with his mind, the only part of him that still seemed to function, _I can't breathe!_

And suddenly, there was a light in the darkness that pushed it back. The light was beautiful, a welcome sight after the horrible black nothingness, although it was almost too bright to look at directly. Kit could breathe again, and move. He looked at that blinding sunburst, and saw, at the center… Nita?

Nita breathed heavily. "Let's go," she said with some effort. "I can't keep this… whatever, away for long." In fact, Kit was now encased in that blinding light.

"Which way?"

Nita didn't answer immediately; she shut her eyes and acquired a look of deep concentration. Finally, she sighed and said, "This way," leading Kit off into a patch of blackness that looked just the same as it looked in any other direction.

"I don't like this," said Kit after a while of walking in the darkness.

"Neither do I," confessed Nita. "It's a real strain to hold this darkness away…" she indicated the aura of light around her.

"What is it?"

She gave a small, grim laugh. "You think I know? I'm just doing my best to keep us from getting suffocated." There were beads of sweat popping out on her forehead now. Kit had been silently trying to use his mind to shoulder some of the burden, push back his own little square of darkness, but as he erected a mental wall around himself, the dark came flooding though. There was some reason that Nita could control this, and he couldn't, and it was all so confusing… "Dim the light!" Nita hissed suddenly at him.

"Huh?" he responded stupidly.

"Dim the light!" she whispered again.

"How?"

"Jesus, I'm keeping the dark out! I can't do two things at once! I dunno… let some back in, I guess."

Kit groaned. He was completely lost here. He had no idea what was going on. All he could do was trust his partner, who had saved his neck a fair few times. _"Let some in…"_ He probed with his mind at Nita's barrier, the edges of the glowing light, and pushed at one spot…

Too late he realized his mistake. The darkness came flooding in again to envelope them. He saw it coming for him, for Nita… _No!_ he thought fiercely, throwing his entire self against the blackness surrounding them, and then he was aware of no more.

* * *

A/N: I've been doin' the cliffhanger thing for so long now, haven't I? More soon, I promise. The review box awaits… hint hint… And I want to know how good a job I've been doing thickening the plot; send your theories on what will happen/what's going on to or REVIEW, DURN YOUS! Lol… XD 


	10. Wizards' Deliberation

A/N: Me again. I know I've been ages, please don't hurt me… :cowers behind blast-shield: anyway, sorry for the kinda-short last chapter… (Oh, and see the previous chapters' disclaimers, I'm too lazy to retype it.)

* * *

Nita crouched over Kit, slapping his face gently. "Kit," she murmured. "Oh please Kit, wake up…" His eyes opened, and she breathed a sigh of relief. 

Kit sat up slowly in the near-total darkness. "What happened?" he asked muzzily. Last he remembered, it being this dark around them would have meant suffocation.

"You used too much of your energy to make that shield," Nita whispered to him, running a hand over the back of his head to see if he'd injured himself when he fell backwards. "It knocked you out, but gave me the time I needed to make a new one… and what I guess we have to do is use our _own_ darkness to dim the light, so it doesn't kill us. Kit, I _know_ where we are."

"Well where are we then, Einstein?" demanded Kit irritably.

"I… we… we're in Dairine."

"Uh…"

"That spell worked after all," Nita informed a stunned Kit. "It just took a while. And I usually do the whole lucid-dream thing, and I guess I pulled you in with me. And… there's _something_ inside of her. It's new.

"Is it Him?" Asked Kit, a feeling of impending doom settling like a pile of bricks in his stomach.

Nita nodded. "Look at all this," she said, waving a hand at the darkness surrounding them both. "It's blacker than the evilest mortal could ever have. I think he's taken over."

"Huh? What's that supposed to mean?"

"My sister," said Nita, voice breaking, "Is being possessed and held prisoner by the Lone Power. Oh, Kit… what're we gonna do…"

Kit stared. It was disconcerting to see the usually calm and composed Nita so close to breaking down. "We get her back, stupid. What else would we do? First, tell me how you figured it out, though."

"Thanks," said Nita with a sniffle and a watery smile. "So… well, I'm pretty sure that the Lone Power used Dari for a shell, and that she was that _rogue wizard_ everyone was after. Remember when you yelled at me that the rogue's spell was a Callahan signature. Well, who's another Callahan wizard?"

"Dairine!" Kit exclaimed, inwardly beating himself for his stupidity at overlooking it."

"Yeah. Even though her power levels weren't at full strength, which means she was using some energy for something else, namely trying to fend off the Lone One. And… remember, you were having that little power outage of your own?"

"Uh-huh. But what has that got to do with—"

"And how her power feed short-circuited and left you even worse off? And how you got your power back the next morning when she vanished?"

Kit just blinked at her for a moment. Finally he said, "If I ever say I'm smart again, hit me."

"But," she went on, "I guess Dairine was starting to realize what was happening, so He just pulled her completely inside herself. And he had that handy little spell to make all the non-wizards forget about her. She's probably off robbing some store across town for the Lone One, while she's also in some funky inner prison trying to find a way out so she can take her body back. And we… we have to go find her," she concluded. "Right?" She looked at Kit for support.

"Duh! Didn't I just say that?"

"Oh yeah… maybe you did. Well, c'mon…" They both stood stiffly. Nita was stooped, unconsciously scared to stand straight and risk passing out of her protective sphere and being spotted by something –someone. Searching for a calm place inside of her that she had discovered when they had entered this strange world, she closed her eyes and breathed deeply. Reached around her with a rope of her magic. She sent her Speech down the rope, repelling the darkness, carefully replacing it with her own, which she drew out with her tube of magic. Then, the effort of the magic making beads of sweat roll down her forehead, she cast the rope about her, feeling for where it reached the least distance.

Partway around the swing, her rope encountered what felt like a solid wall of darkness. It would have fizzled out had Nita not snapped it back to her. "That way," she said breathlessly, leading Kit in the direction of the heavy dark. A part of her brain screamed at her for heading to the darkest part of this already foreboding place, but she knew that they could fine the Lone One where the darkness was thickest. And where he was, Dairine was too.

* * *

A/N: Short, I know, but better than my last stunted little chapter. (Geeeeeeez, is it really as short as it looks on the quick-edit thingie?) Sorry, I don't have much time for updates nowadays… I'm working on Rampage, I swear I am! A few more reviews might give me a little more incentive to update more often… ahem ahem… 


	11. A Wizard's Journey

A/N: Oh wow, it's really been ages since I've updated, hasn't it? From last Thanksgiving? I just finished this year's excuse-- ahem, camp... Geez... SORRY! I hope you all remember this... Thanks for putting up with my, y'all.

Disclaimer: insert standard disclaimer

* * *

Dairine had been sitting in this black little cell for what felt like several days now, and felt more hopeless than she ever had in her life, even when she had been cornered by the Lone Power on her ordeal. Because being trapped isn't the same as being cornered, and now she was trapped. And she thought she knew who it was who was holding her prisoner inside her own mind. The same Someone who was controlling her body now, for reasons she could not begin to fathom. And she couldn't do anything to stop Him from this place that was four black walls and a black ceiling and floor, this place that was so dark she couldn't see a thing, that she could barely tell if she herself was still there.

Again and again in the past few—days? Hours? Weeks? There was no way to tell—she had tested the strength of the cage of darkness that held her, probing it with her wizardry, of which she had a surprisingly little amount left. But there seemed to be no way out. And every time she would attempt to cast a spell to free herself, her captor would appear, cackling maliciously, and subdue her, smothering her with darkness. She would always wake some time later, aching, her head throbbing, and be overwhelmed again by that sense of hopelessness. But always, she would be glad that the Lone One had not used that terrible light on her, as he had on her first day in this prison. A thousand lashings with that darkness would be preferable to one encounter with that blinding, searing, _wrong_ light. In fact, she was almost beginning to embrace the darkness...

_No, no, no!_ Dairine thought fiercely. _You can't think like that! That's what he's trying to do, turn you to the dark!_ She shook herself out of that train of thought. She couldn't let herself be controlled any longer:

_Nita?_ she thought. _Kit? Anyone?_ With a gigantic effort, considering the amount of power at her disposal, she threw her perception out of the walls of the cell. What she "saw" scared her; her inner world was now only the darkness of the Lone Power, stretching everywhere. Everywhere except...

There was one little gap in the darkness, a blip on Dairine's wizardly radar. And that blip of light was moving closer to her. She recognized it. _Nita!_ she thought frantically. _Nita, I'm here!_ And she thought she heard a reply, but a very muffled one. She reached out to contact her sister again, allowing herself a brief ray of hope...

Which was immediately extinguished by a sudden chill presence in her cell, a darkness darker than the inky black that surrounded them. She shuddered, afraid. Fear was not an emotion that Dairine Callahan liked, nor experienced very often. But now, she was afraid. And longing for comfort... No. She couldn't reach out for Nita now, or He would know that she was there. She had to keep her sister safe, even though the only way to do that was to face Him, to distract Him and keep His mind off other things, like the two wizards making their way towards him.

"Tsk tsk," he said in a voice that was agony just to listen to. "Trying to get out, are we?"

_Yes,_ Daring thought fiercely. _That's exactly what I was trying to do_. That was all she allowed herself to think.

"You need a lesson in manners," He said again in that horrible, painful voice. "Something a bit harsher than what we've been doing..." And again, that light split the darkness, striking Dairine. She screamed, then she convulsed, her body weirdly illuminated by the bolt of light that had struck her, and crumpled.

* * *

"There!" said Kit, pointing into the distance, where they could see the afterimage of a lightening bolt. And hear the echoes of a scream.

"Dari!" gasped Nita. That had been Dari's scream... She quickened her pace. Kit was nearly jogging to keep up, but he didn't complain. After all, Nita was the one shielding them from this darkness, after all...

"How do you keep it away?" asked Kit, waving his hand at the blackness surrounding them, except for the little not-quite-as-dark sphere that Nita had created for them.

"I push it away with my light," Nita explained shortly, "then I cover up my light with my darkness. Hard to explain..."

Kit nodded. This was, apparently, one of Nita's "things," but something he was destined not to be able to understand.

Suddenly, he felt cold all over, and shivered. He put a hand on Nita's shoulder to stop her. "Wait," he cautioned in a whisper, crouching low and pulling his partner with him. She took her cue from him and remained silent. She darkened the shield still further.

Cruel, mocking laughter filled the air, and they both shuddered, instinctively taking eachothers' hands. Then the air warmed slightly as the chill presence of the Lone One vanished. Inching forward, Nita and Kit saw, or rather sensed, the wall of Dairine's cell. They both gulped. Kit squeezed Nita's hand, whether for her comfort or his, he did not know.

"I can hide us," Nita said. "Can you open the wall?" Kit nodded mutely and lined up a spell in his head to rearrange the molecules of the wall. Nita, whose forehead was now damp with sweat, called upon all her dark emotions, searching for those that she hadn't already used: her jealousy, her hate, her hopelessness... She pulled them from within her, and laid them around herself and Kit.

Kit's spell worked, but barely. "I don't think... they rearrange themselves... for just... anybody," he panted, wiping his own sweaty forehead.

"Yeah," said Nita, equally out of breath. I had to shield you... make you darker, so He wouldn't notice."

"Thanks," said Kit. He paused for a moment, then looked at Nita. "Well?"

Nita looked scared. But also determined. "Lets go." Checking her shield of light—and the shield of darkness within that—she stepped with Kit into the small, dark room.

* * *

A/N: Heyyyyyy! How'd you like it? I dunno if I lost the style over all this time or got rusty or what, but I hope it's still good. Please review! I really need to know what I'm doing wrong (I hope it's nothing!); constructive criticism is greatly appreciated! 


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